Watch as BAE Systems guide the viewer through the Type 26 Frigate, which will replace most of the Type 23 Frigates as the workhorse of the fleet.
According to BAE, the vessel will be a highly capable and versatile multi-mission warship designed to support anti-submarine warfare, air defence and general purpose operations anywhere on the world’s oceans.
Despite alarming headlines recently, the Type 26 frigates have not been cancelled or “indefinitely postponed”.
Work on building eight Type 26 frigates at Clyde shipyards will begin the summer of 2017, the defence secretary has announced.
Michael Fallon said the date for cutting the first steel would help secure new investment and safeguard hundreds of skilled jobs until 2035.
Additionally, it was announced recently that “preparatory work” has started on the fourth of five new Offshore Patrol Vessels being built on the Clyde.
Sick.
So yet again another RN ship with no modern anti-ship weapons?
A ‘warship’? More like a DEMS. This needs real work not a PR CGI.
The original plan for the class had been 8 anti-submarine warfare variants and five general purpose variants, this remains largely unchanged except for the specification of the later five vessels”
The original plan was for 13 T26 for the RN and for this to be an international project ( a naval version of the F35) , raising the total orders to over 30. Brazil, Australia, India, Turkey, Canada and even the USA were touted as potential customers. The RN order for 13 was to cost around £4bn.
Now 8 for the RN, no international partners (to help spread the R&D the costs) as yet, no orders – although Australia remains an possibility. The cost to the RN is now quoted at £1bn a ship.
From a business and economic point of view the T26 programme has already failed joining the long list UK MOD procurement mistakes.
The great hope is now the T31 frigate. My own humble opinion is that the T31 programme should be accelerated, the T23 remain in service longer than currently planned and the T26 procured at a latter date.
Despite the fact that they are very expensive and we’ll need more of them you can’t deny that they will be brilliant ships!??
@MS – “The great hope is now the T31 frigate. My own humble opinion is that the T31 programme should be accelerated, the T23 remain in service longer than currently planned and the T26 procured at a latter date.”
I agree that T31 should be accelerated but BAE (if it gets the T31 contract, not a foregone conclusion) has already indicated that it believes it can parallel build T26 and T31 on the Clyde with only modest additional investment in facilities there. If somewhere else in the UK got at least some of the T31 build contracts then obviously that could be done in parallel with T26 happening on the Clyde. Either way I think accelerate T31 and build in parallel with early T26s is the way to go.
Also, I don’t think T31 really makes sense unless we get more than 5. The government has at least hinted that is a possibility. 8 x T31 would be a fantastic outcome given where we’re starting from. Last 5 T23s at 185 crew each frees up 925 personnel to crew 8 x T31 at 115 each. Given T26 at 8,000 tonnes is planned to have 118 basic complement the smaller probably 4,000 – 5,000 tonne T31 should need even fewer crew, maybe as few as 85, so there might even be crew left over to fill gaps elsewhere in the fleet (or even more T31 but I can’t see that happening). Actually, each T23 decommissioned releases 185 crew which is almost enough to crew a T26 (118 crew) + an 85 crew T31. It’s 18 crew short but it’s really close!